A guess “to satisfy public demand” but wrapped in the prestige of ‘settled science’.
And on this basis, small children have gone to bed weeping, hugging their stuffed teddy bears, worried sick about the doom facing these cuddly animals. That’s despicable on all levels !!

August 19, 2000. “The North Pole is melting. The thick ice that has for ages covered the Arctic Ocean at the pole has turned to water; recent visitors there reported yesterday; something that has presumably never before been seen by humans and is more evidence that global warming may be real and already affecting climate.The last time scientists can be certain the pole was awash in water was more than 50 million years ago.
”It was totally unexpected,” said Dr. James J. McCarthy, an oceanographer at Harvard University and the co-leader of a group working for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; Dr Malcolm. McKenna said”I don’t know if anybody in history ever got to 90 degrees north to be greeted by water, not ice”http://www.nytimes.com/2000/08/19/us/ages-old-icecap-at-north-pole-is-now-liquid-scientists-find.html?scp=1&sq=August%2019%202000%20North%20Pole&st=cse

“Coral reefs bleaching to death. Global warming could now mean a death sentence for many coral reefs. If the present rate of destruction continues, most of the world’s coral reefs could be killed within our lifetime.” WWF

Coral bleaching is a natural process as one species of coral is replaced by another, because some species do better than others, depending on water temperature. Come back in a couple of years and the once bleached coral is now all healthy. What kills coral is fresh water & increased silt carried by rivers after inland areas are flooded. This smothers the coral.

“Hottest on record”

Claims that 2014 (& 2015 see below **) was the “hottest year on record,” and July 2015 was “the hottest July” since “at least 1880,” are based on city and airport temperatures that are always several degrees higher than those at nearby rural sites.
(Satellite data show no warming for last 18 years.)
The “superheated planet” alarms, involve hundredths of a degree: that’s less than the margins of error!
They are based mainly on only 1,200 measuring stations for Earth’s entire surface – with few in the coldest regions, and millions of km² of missing data simply extrapolated from urban numbers.
The “hottest ever” charade also assumes reliable temperature data exist for the entire planet all the way back to 1880! It defies belief.

Met Office Hadley Centre director Prof Stephen Belcher said: “We know natural patterns contribute to global temperatures in any given year, but the very warm temperatures so far this year (2015) indicate the continued impact of (manmade) greenhouse gases. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34226178

“we estimate a 97% probability that 2015 will become the warmest year on record” NOAA
( note the 97% fig again !!) They are looking for 1hundreths of a degree!!! See Global Temperature Measurements.

A couple of sure fire clues for this are – the highest Arctic sea ice extent in over a decade, and the coldest January-March on record in the Northeast US. Forty-one inches of snow in 24 hours in southern New Mexico is another dead giveaway of an overheated atmosphere; as is the coldest autumn on record on the Greenland ice sheet.

“By the year 2000 the United Kingdom will be simply a small group of impoverished islands, inhabited by some 70 million hungry people … If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.” Paul Ehrlich, September 1971. http://tinyurl.com/pe8oohp

In that case we must be a figment of our own imagination !!

‘Secret report’ warns of rioting and nuclear war; Britain will be ‘Siberian’ in less than 20 years; Threat to the world is greater than terrorism.
“As early as next year (2005) widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major upheaval for millions.”
Pentagon defence adviser Andrew Marshall Feb 2004. – https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2004/feb/22/usnews.theobserver

Oct 2015 – Patricia, The ‘Unprecedented’ ‘bigger than a Cat 5’ “Most Dangerous Hurricane In History” apparently made land fall as a Cat 2, then turned into a “Named Tropical Depression” all in a few hrs; with no death & limited damage.

Seems the only record it’s broken is for amount of hype & misinformation/ lies generated.